“Then you must be willing to fight," Mircea responded. "Life is not a gift, Raphael; it's a challenge. Rise to it!”

“Rise to the challenges that life presents you. You can't develop genuine character and ability by sidestepping adversity and struggle.”

“Challenges are gifts that force us to search for a new center of gravity. Don't fight them. Just find a new way to stand.”

“I'm extremely willful to win, and I respond to challenges. Scoring titles and stuff like that… it sounds, well, I don't care how it sounds - to me, scoring comes easy. It's not a challenge to me to win the scoring title, because I know I can.”

“Life is a challenge" he once told me, "and only those who rise to the challenge truly know what it means to live.”

“The most glorious moments in your life are not the so-called days of success, but rather those days when out of dejection and despair you feel rise in you a challenge to life, and the promise of future accomplishments.”

“Whether or not you choose to rise to that challenge is up to you. Either way, history will judge you.”

“You must be willing to pay the price of being called an “adult”. Stop and reflect upon your life.”

“Decoupling growth from environmental degradation is the number one challenge facing governments in a world of rising numbers of people, rising incomes, rising consumption demands and the persistent challenge of poverty alleviation.”

“The main lesson for Europe and the world is clear: as a matter of urgency, globalization must be fundamentally re-oriented. The main challenges of our times are the rise in inequality and global warming. We must therefore implement international treaties enabling us to respond to these challenges and to promote a model for fair and sustainable development. Agreements of a new type can, if necessary, include measures aimed at facilitating these exchanges. But the question of liberalizing trade should no longer be the main focus. Trade must once again become a means in the service of higher ends. It never should have become anything other than that.”